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“To this day I’m—on occasion—” She shakes her head. Her eyes dart my way as she picks up her pace. “I’m referred to as ‘the mute.’ I suppose there are those like Mark who’ve never heard me speak. Even though it’s been years since that time.” She steps around a stone in the path, not looking back as I hang half a pace behind her.
“No one here before me ever stopped speaking.” Her words are forceful, almost harsh. “Some assumed the stint at sea had ruined my mind, but those who cared to realized that I wasn’t daft. I would write a note at odd times…although mostly I got on through nods and other methods. And still…”
She folds her arms across her chest as we walk through a blanket of fog. “Some treated me as if I couldn’t hear either. I’ve been privy to more secrets than you can imagine. Like a priest a bit in that way.”
Our path slants down into a grassy valley at the base of the peak, which looks large and dark, mostly in shadow. Her strides lengthen. So do mine.
“There are others who assume I’m simple,” she continues. “Some don’t speak to me, because for years they felt there was no point in doing so. They’ve checked the box beside my name that says non-entity.”
She looks over her shoulder at me. “Do you want to know the truth, Declan? The truth is no one ever courted me. I was never kissed under the arches. Others got sent off to university, but never me. I’m a fixture on this island but I’m never truly seen. I haven’t been since Mummy was alive and never will be again. It doesn’t matter how much pottery I sell and ship out or how often I bandage a mashed finger. When I’m buried I’ll be most known for lacking my voice—because someone like Mark Glass has failed to notice when I use it.”
Twenty-Seven
Finley
I tell myself to slow down, but my legs rebel. Perhaps because of my confinement to the boat for those days, I’ve become a runner of the worst sort. When I’m emotional, I flee. This is worse than usual, because I’m fleeing him.
The more my own words echo through my mind—the more I picture him on my heels, his handsome face contorted in shock and dismay—the more I feel I simply must keep moving.
I dart up the packed-dirt path as it tilts at the foot of the peak. My harsh steps startle a bird. I can feel mud spitting off my shoes.
The trail’s not marked because we locals know it, and we don’t allow the visitors to summit alone. So it’s possible that I might lose him if I’m speedy enough.
I duck under some vines that hang over the trail and dash around a wide rock. When I hear footfall, I move faster.
Now he’ll know how mad I really am. Not merely some unknown girl, but the island’s wretched outcast. I’m assuaged by a feeling of loss—the loss of something I can’t name. A sort of twisted hope, I suppose. Hope that sprung forth anew when I realized a bit earlier he doesn’t know my darkest secret yet. He hasn’t heard.
Still, I flee him like I should have fled the moment we escaped the burrow. Like someone who’s got everything to lose, whose life is altered each time she gets near him. My pack bumps atop my back, and my heart hammers.
If he turns back, that will be the end of things, and I can move forward on my life’s track…however desolate that may be. I could even go to him a bit before he’s due to leave and spill my own secret…and ask for help. A voice inside me screams “no” at that prospect.
My chest feels tighter than a rubber band, my throat a vice clamp as my poor, unfeeling body rushes up the cool slope. When I’m above the wind-bent grass and scattered stones, when the path before me has gone stark with elevation, I hear him. I feel him.
And then his footfall is too close, and his thick arm captures my shoulders, locking my back against his chest. My eyes close, and I feel the heat of him, the bulk of his thick body. I can smell him—the slightly spicy, uniquely Declan scent that stirs some sleeping dragon in me.
“Siren.” It’s an exhalation.
He turns me around to face him, and I do so like a good doll. I look at his face, his indecipherable face. His handsome features are impassive, but he always fails to lock away the feeling in his eyes. I hate his eyes the most—the kindness I see there, the concern.
“I don’t need your pity, you know. I’m pretty like you, and though I’m not absurdly wealthy, I am talented and clever.”
I watch as his face transforms, its hard lines bending as he grins, then gives a low chuckle. It’s a rich and husky sound that warms my bones.
I close my eyes and bow my head and pray perhaps he’ll just jog off and leave me be. But I have no such luck.
His hand captures my chin, his long fingers curving around my jaw. “C’mon, Finley. Look at me.”
“I can’t,” I whisper.
“Why not?”
Against my will, my lips quiver. I press them together.
“I’m looking pretty strung out for someone clean. You scared to look at me, Siren?”
I peek up at him, my gaze drawn to the dark circles beneath his eyes. “Don’t be moronic.”
His jaw hardens. “Finley, do you think I give a fuck about your past? That I would judge you for it? Me?” His eyes are so angry, my heart lurches a bit.
